


Aay'han: Undercurrent of Remorse

by StarWarsSyl



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace, Star Wars Prequel Trilogy
Genre: Attachment Not Being Love, Exploration of How Jedi Love, F/M, Fusion of Star Wars Legends and Disney Canon, Gen, Jedi Culture Celebrated, Mandalorian Torture, Pre-Pacifist Satine, Satine in Armor, Some Survival Horror, Wilderness Survival, fan novel
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-06-03
Updated: 2018-09-15
Packaged: 2019-05-17 15:49:17
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 5
Words: 15,245
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14835246
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/StarWarsSyl/pseuds/StarWarsSyl
Summary: Padawan Kenobi has met a primal killer, an apex predator, and is drawn to her like a loadstone. A year on her turf in a fight for survival? Does he really stand a chance?Of course not.*Title change; sorry, everybody.*





	1. Chapter 1

 

“What do you mean, you  _ can’t send help _ ?” Satine Kryze stared at the larger-than-life hologram of the Supreme Chancellor in shock. Soot streaked her face and both blood and mud, her armor. “My people are out there  _ dying _ !”

“Unfortunately, the Senate has ruled this an internal affair for Mandalore,” Finis Valorum said, his tone gentle and his face sympathetic. “I’m afraid there’s nothing I can do.”

He couldn’t be serious. “An  _ internal affair _ ?”

“Your people must decide what leader they wish. We can’t very well step in on behalf of any one of the three contestants, and you are one of them. The others haven’t asked for arbitration. Without the request coming from all three factions, or at least two of the three, the Jedi cannot intervene.”

“Why?” Satine demanded, and she didn’t care if she was talking back to the most powerful man in the Galactic Republic. Her people were killing each other as they spoke, and she  _ would have  _ an answer.

“My dear, I understand you are upset. You have every right to be. But the Jedi can’t go around toppling governments and choosing rulers for people. It would destroy democracy. Your people have to decide.”

“My people can’t agree on anything,” Satine returned, but it sounded less snappish and more like a plea to her eighteen-year-old ears.

“Then one of your proposed leaders is going to have to take control and force the others into line. I’m sorry. Once there is a new Mand’alor in place,  _ then  _ we can talk. If that Mand’alor requests the help of the Jedi, the Senate may very well agree.”

“Why can’t I talk with the Jedi myself?”  
Valorum went very quiet for a moment, looking thoughtful as he studied her. Then he glanced away, at something outside her view, and waved, as if sending something or someone out of the room. He waited, until the exit had been made.

He leaned towards Satine and asked, voice quiet, “If I could do that— transfer your call directly to Master Yoda, you would only ask for advice, and  _ wouldn’t _ ask for help?”

“Absolutely,” Satine lied earnestly.

The Chancellor nodded. “As it happens, I have a friend in the Order. I’ll see what I can do. I can’t say how long this will take, or even if it  _ can,  _ but if you’re really serious about this, stay put.”

Satine gave him a solemn nod in return, then waited as the holo fell into a holding pattern. The minutes dragged past, slow and unmerciful. She  _ could  _ go get one of the chairs near the edge of the room, but...

Standing in the same place she’d been left would convey a message, and she could take the standing. And the waiting.

A good hunter knew how to wait.

 

* * *

 

“Master Gallia?” Yoda sat in his hoverchair, gimer stick across his knees. “Urgent, your requested visit with the Chancellor was?”

“Yes, Master,” Adi agreed. “I have a time-sensitive request. You’ve already been briefed on the Mandalore situation?”  
Sadness fell across Yoda like a heavy weight.

He’d seen the young woman’s appeal to the Senate. She’d been brave, professional, and eloquent.

And she’d offered the most stable leader choice Mandalore had seen in thousands of years.

Perhaps ever.

And she was actually  _ asking  _ for Jedi assistance.

If only she could gain the will of her people and be appointed Mand’alor,  _ then  _ the Jedi could help. They would be  _ thrilled  _ to help. To finally set to rest the old hostility between Mandalorian and Jedi would be beautiful.

But Satine Kryze had to move her people’s hearts  _ herself.  _ It was something the central government couldn’t do and still protect freedom.

And most certainly, the Jedi couldn’t pick Mandalore’s leader  _ for  _ them any more than they could pick Alderaan’s, or Corellia’s, or the next Supreme Chancellor.

“Valorum wants to know if you’d be willing to speak with young Kryze privately, over holo. He has her on the line now waiting. She’s been warned not to request help, and she seems to understand our quandary.”

“What she wants, do you know?”

“Advice it seems, Master.”

Now  _ that  _ he could give. Yoda bowed his head. “Speak with her, I will.”

 

* * *

 

Over a standard hour had passed before the Senate emblem resolved into a diminutive wrinkled form with sweeping ears. “Satine Kryze of Mandalore, Master Yoda this is.”

Satine’s heart leaped into her throat.

She knew of Yoda, of course. She had studied the Jedi Order in her training for adulthood, and she’d even gone beyond what had been required...

But this was her first time to ever speak to a Jedi. Let alone one this old, this experienced—

This influential.

She had one chance. Just one more, for this to work.

She bowed deeply to the hologram. “Master Jedi. It is an honor. Thank you for being willing to speak with me.”

“Just hope, I do, that assistance I can give.”

“Mandalore has been unstable since before we started keeping track of our own history,” Satine said, standing tall, looking him in the eye. Careful not to be challenging, but instead respectful and firm. “I don’t believe it has to be that way. I believe that we can see peace in  _ this generation.  _ That instead of being the scourge of the galaxy, we can be a helpful, useful member of the galactic community.”

“Encouraged I was, by your appeal to the Senate,” Yoda returned, tone cordial. “Sorry I am, that your request, denied has been.”

“As am I, Master Jedi. I am young and with little experience.”  _ I couldn’t even save my relationship with my sister. How can I, alone, bring harmony to a planetful of the Mando’ade?  _ “I have a vision of a brighter future, but I need the help of skilled mediators. The Jedi for thousands of years have honed their skills in resolving conflicts. Turning enemies at least into allies, if not friends. Forestalling wars and protecting the innocent. Right now, my planet is being torn apart by violence, and the innocent are suffering and dying because my people aren’t skilled with communication. Because they won’t talk this through. The concept of settling anything through a nonviolent vote is foreign to them.”

“And convinced you are, that if send Jedi we did, that listen to them your people would? That allowed to help they would be?”

Satine’s heart sank to her boots.

Absolutely not.

She struggled to keep the grim expression from her face.

The Jedi had been her last hope for averting the pending war, a last ditch plan since all other plans had failed.

_You think of them as magical, Satine. But even perfect control over one’s own self can’t clear away some things._

_Like the general distaste of Mando’ade for self mastery and anyone who practices it._

No. If Mandalorians were killing Mandalorians in a struggle to place their chosen Mand’alor at the head, there was  _ no way in osik  _ that they would listen to a  _ Jedi. _ It would take an army of Jedi to beat the populace into submission... 

And even then, the people would respond with hate, anger, and would never truly be or remain conquered. As soon as the ruling structure’s back was turned,  _ wham.  _

A new war.

As much as the Senate’s decision felt like a betrayal and abandonment, they were probably right.

The thought sickened Satine.

She had nothing to offer Yoda.

She could almost feel his gaze reaching deep into her, as if reading her very soul.

“Is there no hope for my people?” she asked, the weight of it all striking her. Her eyes burned with unshed tears.  _ Are we condemned to forever be spilling our own family’s blood? Being the monsters under the bed that children fear? _

“Great hope for your people there is,” Yoda replied, voice gentle, his walking stick reaching out to her now, jabbing at her to give his words emphasis. “That hope,  _ you are. _ ”

Satine blew out an unsteady breath. “Many of them want to kill me, and the others don’t care. There is nothing I can do. I don’t have an army. And even if I did, no army will bring lasting change to Mandalore. If we’ve proven  _ anything  _ in the last ten thousand years and more, it’s  _ that. _ ”

“Win your people through might you will not,” Yoda agreed. “Their  _ minds.  _ Their  _ hearts.  _ These, you must capture.” He leaned against his stick once more, a thoughtful frown on his face. “Creative, you must be. Beyond the box, think. Not classic politics, and not warfare, but something of both, your task will be.”

Satine felt her shoulders sagging from their usual military posture. “I don’t know how, and I don’t know where to start.”  _ That is why I turned to you, the warriors with the greatest skill in this new field, for training. _

“Safe are you, where you are?”

“Safe as I can be in a world of professional assassins. Some Kryze loyalists are standing with me.”

“Enough, will that be, to safeguard your life?”

“Master Yoda, there are two armies out there, both of which would like me out of the way.”

The ancient Master sighed. “A difficult and painful path to healing for Mandalore will it be. Long, perhaps. Steadfast determination you will need. And heart. Great heart, I sense in you.”

“Heart will not be enough, Master Yoda.”  
“On the contrary;  _ only  _ heart, enough will be.” Yoda’s face grew very earnest, and once again he waved his staff at her. “Your people, listen to reason will not. Followed their hearts they always have, and  _ only  _ their hearts this violence can stop.  _ Want  _ to stop the violence, they must.”

“They  _ glory  _ in violence, Master Yoda. We train our children to  _ love  _ it. To feel  _ incomplete  _ without it. We  _ live  _ for it. I’m afraid my people are incapable of even conceiving what a different path would look like. The idea of seeing one another as  _ Mandalorians first  _ instead of each clan viewing the others as enemies... I don’t know if they can even understand such a thing.”  
“Then it is up to you, a better path to show them.”

“Master Yoda, I am at a complete loss. I have no one to train me, no one to advise me, and nowhere from which to start.”

She couldn’t let Yoda’s calming eyes reach her too deeply. She knew that as soon as she was off the holo, all of her difficulties would return tenfold.

“All that you need, within your own heart already is.”

Satine stood tall and her gaze didn’t stray from his. “How am I going to find it, Master, without someone to show me how?”

For a long moment there was silence, and Yoda stared at the floor in apparent thought. Satine almost held her breath, afraid of somehow cutting short his attempt to solve her problem.

_ He...  _ is  _ thinking about some way to help me, isn’t he? _

Satine carefully drained her mind of the questioning, and the turmoil, and simply waited, ready to combat whatever came next.

Yoda glanced up at her, the movement swift and his expression keen. Almost as if he’d sensed her mental exercise.

_ Probably did. _

 

* * *

 

Yoda had.

And it settled his fierce internal debate.

He couldn’t leave young Satine to struggle on her own, not when she was fighting so hard. She wasn’t a Jedi. She wasn’t one of the younglings it was his responsibility to grow and train.

But in a sense she  _ was  _ his responsibility.

She’d come to his attention, after all.

“Where you are, a landing platform is there?” Yoda asked.

Satine hid her surprise well.

She had surprising control over herself for one who had been raised steeped in Mandalorian culture. That was something Yoda wanted very much to nurture.

“No, but there is a large field that can accommodate a landing.”

“Stay there for a few hours longer, can you?”

“Yes... but the loyalists and I want to leave soon. It’s not safe here anymore.”

“Send you help, I cannot. But visit you, a friend of mine will. Trust him implicitly you can, but sent by us he is  _ not. _ ”

Cautious hope dawned in clear blue eyes. “Will he be able to advise me?”

“Help you reach into yourself, he will. But win your people for you, he cannot. Your task, that must remain.”

“I understand, Master Yoda.” Relief breathed through Satine’s voice. “I will be awaiting your friend’s arrival.”

Yoda bowed to her. “Though sensitive to it you are not, the Force with you is, and will remain.”

“Thank you, Master Yoda.”

 


	2. Chapter 2

 

Satine waited.

She tried to still her restlessness, knowing it to be unhelpful.

Either assassins  _ would  _ arrive before the friend of the Jedi did, or they  _ wouldn’t _ .

She would deal with it, either way.

The men who followed her knew she was expecting a ship, but not who the individual on board would be.

_ I don’t know myself. _

Yoda had asked for their coordinates, but had been vague as to when exactly she could expect their visitor.

The ship that arrived several hours later turned out to be a small, nondescript freighter. Satine requested privacy from the loyalists, and they agreed, but made a point of staying within shouting-distance in case she needed help.

Satine approached the ship, careful to keep a calm, professional expression on her face. She was young and asking for help, and that she could accept, but she had no intention of coming off like a child wasting Yoda’s time.

When the landing ramp lowered, Satine felt surprise to see two figures step out of the ship. Both cloaked in coarse, dark brown cloth with hoods deeply lowered over their faces, one was quite tall while the other— following just a step behind and to the side of the first— only a little bit taller than herself.

Satine waited as they approached. They came to a stop before her, and the taller one pushed back his hood.

It revealed a man past his prime, but Satine was unsure by how far. The hair that was drawn back from his face, bound, and allowed to fall around his shoulders was a shade somewhere between soil and durasteel. He had a carefully trimmed beard and mustache of the same color, and clear blue eyes.

“Satine Kryze?” he asked, tone polite.

“Yes,” she answered, feeling dwarfed by his size. He wasn’t just tall; he was broad and fit. She could tell it even beneath the heavy robe.

“My name is Qui-Gon Jinn. I am a friend of Master Yoda’s.”

“Come inside?” Satine offered, gesturing towards the house.

Qui-Gon glanced at the Mando’ade standing guard. “The fewer who see us together, the better. I would feel more comfortable if we held this discussion onboard the ship instead.”

“It’s alright, Dru-Idor,” Satine murmured into the comm on her wrist. “I’m going to be on the ship for a while.”

“We’ll keep patrolling the area. Let you know if anything comes up,” was the ready reply.

Satine looked up at Qui-Gon with a smile she feared looked fake. “Let’s go, then.” She walked beside Qui-Gon while the shorter figure fell in behind them. Satine’s sphere of attention automatically focused behind herself, her ears listening for any sign of attack.

_ Definitely not someone used to dealing with warriors,  _ she decided.  _ Or they  _ mean  _ to put me on edge. _

The ramp led into a cargo area which took up most of the small ship, ending in a four-step ladder leading to the cockpit area.

Satine immediately situated herself to be able to keep both beings in sight, the habit far too strong for even the desire to be polite to break.

“While we did study the current political landscape of Mandalore on our flight here, we’re still new to what’s happening. May I give you my take on the situation and you can tell me whether it’s accurate or not?” Jinn asked.

Satine gave him a nod. “Certainly.”

“Your former Mand’alor has aged to the point where he can no longer control the clans. He named your father as his successor, but given the Mand’alor’s dementia, that claim is being contested. Clan Kryze backed your father, but only Clan Kryze. Clans Rook and Eldar have both put forward candidates, and the rest of the clans have rallied to one or the other. Your father, seeing he couldn’t gather a large enough army on his own, is now backing Eldar’s claim, splintering Clan Kryze’s unity.”

Satine shrugged. “They agreed to back a Kryze. Not an Eldar.”

“Some have gone with him, others have withdrawn entirely from the approaching conflict, and still others have decided that his decision has betrayed Clan Kryze and that the leadership of the clan should fall to his eldest available child: you.”

“Kryze loyalists. Yes. A very tiny percentage.”

“So now there are three potential Mand’alors, a Rook, an Eldar, or yourself. There has been no formal declaration of war as yet, but a few battles have been fought. Your desire is to stay out of the violence and find some way to end it, so you have kept your loyalists out of the fray. How small would you say your following is?”

“Roughly two hundred in full armor— men and women.”  _ And some teenagers. _ In fact, many of those two hundred formed entire families.

“Will your father intercede for you with Clan Eldar?”

Satine’s eyebrows shot up in surprise. “What? No. Both armies are targeting me. I’m a threat to the one and a disgrace to the other. I’ve been disowned. General opinion is that the two hundred standing by me are doing so only because their oaths bind them from joining the other two armies, and they love the fight too much to just sit it out. No one would be crazy enough to follow me willingly.”

Qui-Gon frowned. “What is the average Mandalorian citizen’s view towards the current conflict? Those who aren’t actively fighting for a side?”  
“Those who  _ aren’t _ actively fighting?” Satine repeated, numbly.

Qui-Gon was right.

He  _ wasn’t _ familiar with Mandalore.

“The only Mandalorians  _ not  _ fighting are within the group of Kryzes who are refusing to back the Eldars, but would rather die than help  _ me. _ They may not be fighting the  _ war _ , but they are hunting for me to take me out because I disgraced the clan name. The average citizen  _ wants  _ this war. Their pulse is up, raging. Even the wives and husbands who weren’t raised Mando, but have been adopted into our culture, want in. The children want this fight. They are  _ all  _ actively in it.  _ That  _ is how the general population feels. Even nine-year-olds are fighting with each other in the streets.”

“ _ Killing  _ one another?” Qui-Gon asked, visibly shocked. 

“Usually not,” Satine returned.  _ Now  _ he was starting to get it. She hoped this made its way back to Yoda. Did the ancient Master know just how bad things were? “Sometimes, yes. From the earliest ages we’re taught to idolize victory, and to hate and kill our enemies. The definition of  _ enemy  _ is very broad, and both family and allies can shift into that hated group rather easily. By the age of nine, the average Mandalorian child has had two years in armor, with hard training in the wilderness and in combat.”

Stunned silence fell, and the smaller figure seemed to withdraw into itself further, shoulders forward just a bit, head lowered a little more. Qui-Gon’s brow furrowed in thought for a few long moments. “You can’t bring peace where it isn’t wanted,” he said finally. “Not without a significant army and significant bloodshed. And the peace would last only so long as your army could retain tight control.”

“Besides the fact that  _ that  _ would be tyranny and the death of freedom, my people would never accept it. Imagine a planet full of Mandalorian warriors who feel enslaved. It’s one thing to force or scare a planet’s population into some semblance of order. It’s a whole different situation when we’re talking about my people.”

“You’re right, but I would not advocate the use of that sort of brute force in a non-Mandalorian setting either.”

Satine felt her expression darkening. “What  _ would  _ you suggest I do? Just let them fight?”  _ That certainly isn’t going to happen. _

Her people were  _ one people,  _ even if they didn’t see it, and she was  _ done  _ watching Mandalorian kill Mandalorian while feeling like they’d done the world a service.  _ We aren’t making progress. We’re millennia behind other worlds in the sciences, arts, anything other than the art of murdering our own people. _

And haar’chak, if that wasn’t the  _ stupidest  _ thing she’d ever heard of.

_ We should aim that hate for  _ actual  _ enemies instead of crippling our own ability to progress. _

Then again,  _ was  _ there anything she  _ could  _ do? If Mandalorians wanted to fight, nothing could stop them from doing so.

Certainly not reason.

“Just let them fight  _ for a time, _ ” Qui-Gon clarified. “Warrior Kryze, your people don’t listen to authority well, do they?”  
_ No. Not even our vaunted Mand’alors.  _ Satine might have found it morbidly amusing, if she hadn’t felt so angry. They were killing one another to place someone in a position where they would then be ignored and disobeyed.

Qui-Gon wasn’t done.

“They are motivated by three things— self gain and self preservation, both of which extend to the people they consider in their small circle of loyalty and not a step beyond— and perceived honor. Am I right?”  
Satine’s lip curled in a snarl and her eyes flashed—

_ But is it all that false? We say family and honor... but family only means family under certain circumstances. _

Something Satine knew painfully well.

“Yes,” Satine grit out, holding his gaze.

“Right now, they’re willing to lose people they care about as well as loss to personal and clan gain in order to protect their perceived honor,” Qui-Gon continued. “If the violence is to stop, people are going to have to want it to stop. They’re going to have to see that the war is costly. It harms them, it harms their families. Both sides have to see  _ benefit  _ to stopping. And people have to find  _ benefit  _ in turning to your rule instead of the options provided by Eldar and Rook. From what I’ve gathered, it seems unlikely your people will be able to see this from being demonstrated through words. They’ll have to see that their way won’t work.”

Satine nearly laughed in his face. “With all due respect, Jinn, they haven’t seen it in thousands of years. Why would they see it now?”  
“Because now, they have you to show them a better way,” he replied, quiet assurance unwavering.

“Master Yoda said something very similar,” Satine sighed, “but why would they listen to me?”  
“Because you are a Mandalorian, with a legitimate claim to their leadership, whether they think you’re the best choice or not. A Mandalorian who grew up in their culture, who was taught their values, with a father they knew and respected at one point, whether they follow him now or not. Your world has never seen that before. You are uniquely placed to break this cycle of misery and death, but it will require waiting until the time is right. Laying low. Offplanet but nearby would be best.”

Satine stared at him, her heart growing heavier by the standard second. “You want me to run and  _ hide _ ? While my people suffer and die?”

“Are you willing to die for your people, Satine?” Qui-Gon asked, face deadly grave as he took a step closer to her.

Satine’s heart surged upward again, an instant, automatic response. “Yes,” she replied quietly, eyes glinting.

“Are you willing to do something much, much harder for your innate Mandalorian pride and yes, hide and wait for them?”

Satine felt as if the ground had been swept from under her feet, leaving her suspended in air for a moment, and then plunging into an abyss.

“You can run into the streets now and beg for the violence to stop, achieving nothing and most likely getting yourself and your two hundred, along with their families, killed. Or you can wait until your words can be heard and effective, and you can pull your people out of war and into a time of peace.”

Satine’s gut told her to ignore the offworlder and do things her own way. To find some immediate fix to the problem.

It even leaned in the direction of loosing her two hundred on the other clans to try to knock sense into their heads.

But no.

It was listening to these sorts of urges over logic and wisdom that had gotten them in this mess in the first place. It certainly wouldn’t get them  _ out. _

So, though it burned, Satine gave a determined nod. “Offplanet, you said? I was born on Kalevala. My family has an estate there. I can wait and they’ll know where to find me if they ever decide to listen.”

“No,” Qui-Gon countered. “I gave a cursory investigation to the nearby systems and other planets of  _ this  _ system on our flight here. Draboon seemed the best fit.”

“ _ Draboon _ ?” Surprise washed away the blaze. “It’s a wilderness, even more so than Kalevala. And while Kalevala has a community of future-thinking Mandalorians, the few people who  _ do  _ live on Draboon don’t care about our politics at all as long as the mines keep running.”

Perhaps he’d gotten the name of the planet he  _ meant  _ mixed up with—

“The fewer involved in the political arena, the better. I know you’re itching for a fight, I can sense it, but we’re not looking for a stronghold to barricade ourselves in that can then be attacked and massacred.”

_Point,_ she conceded.

“Are you up for the challenge of living in the wild?” Qui-Gon asked.

Satine smiled a little, as she saw his calm, matter-of-fact expression. “I’ve been trained from infancy to be. Draboon’s wilds will be different from Manda’yaim’s and Kalevala’s, but it’s all Mandalore, Jinn. Many of the same principles will apply. I will adapt.”

“Then we should leave at once. What do you have to do to prepare?”

“Nothing. I’m ready. All I need to do is give the vode directions for while I’m gone— unless I’m misreading you and you think I should take them. If they’re not home, fellow Kryzes may take out their land and livestock.”

Qui-Gon looked surprised, and even impressed. “No, you’re right. I would advise against letting anyone, even friends, know where you’re headed. You have an entire planet of professional killers after you.”

“As long as I have my trace-protected comlink, they can contact me if they absolutely must. I’ll tell them to not unless the situation is dire.”

“A wise choice.”

“I have but one question.” Satine paused, then glanced at the still form near the control panel, then back to Qui-Gon again. “How long can you stay?”

“As long as we’re needed.”

The silent figure stirred with discomfort again.

_ Somewhere else you want to be? _

“Then I have but one question. Are  _ you  _ prepared to live in the wilds of Draboon for an undetermined length of time?” Satine asked. She might be trained to avoid those hunting her and survive, but dragging along two civilian consultants would make everything much more difficult.

The silent figure snorted a low laugh at that.

Qui-Gon smiled. “I suppose you could say we’ve been trained from infancy to be.” He peeled off his cloak, and to Satine’s shock, beneath it he wore the tan robes of the Jedi Order. A lightsaber hung at his belt.

“You’re Jedi,” she hissed in surprise. “I thought the Council wasn’t sending help?”

“They didn’t,” Qui-Gon returned calmly.

Satine’s eyes narrowed. “But you’re here.”

“Master Yoda went into great detail about the trouble here, and said no one was being sent.”

“You came anyway?”  
“Officially, we are not here, Warrior Kryze. This does have to be very clear. If we run into someone who recognizes us for what we are, the Council  _ did not  _ send us, and Yoda  _ did say  _ they weren’t going to send anyone. That it wasn’t our jurisdiction. He and the Council are free from blame however this turns out.”

Satine sent a swift glance to the now-stiff figure who still hid beneath the other robe. “But Master Yoda said he was sending a friend.”

“Did he?” Qui-Gon studied her in amusement. “Or did he say a friend of his was  _ coming _ ? He doesn’t tell me about trouble he  _ doesn’t _ want me meddling with. He knows I follow missions as I find needs. He didn’t send me, but he knew I’d come if I knew there was a need, and he made very sure I knew about yours.”

_ Devious, _ Satine mused, warmth sparkling in her heart. Not a very Mandalorian way of solving a problem, but cunning all the same. “I have a pack in the house, and I will speak to the vode. I’ll be back in ten standard minutes.”  
“The ship will be warmed and ready.”

Satine turned, threw the smaller figure— a Jedi too?— a nod, and kept going.

Her orders were simple enough to give.

Go back home. Wait for my signal. Don’t engage in the war, focus instead on defending your homes.

And if you can, talk about peace. Harmony between brothers instead of hate.

That last part might be a bit much, but she had to believe it possible.

Not the harmony part.

The  _ talking  _ part.

Her orders were met with a few grimaces, but no challenges to her authority. None of them particularly wanted to follow the brain-addled heir, but they had their oaths.

Satine easily made it back onto the ship by the ten minute mark.

Since neither Qui-Gon nor his silent companion were to be seen in the hold, Satine closed the hatch herself. As the ramp folded up, she watched her home be blocked from view.

She’d spent most of her growing up years here. So had her father.

It was Kryze land going back many generations...

And now she was leaving.

She might return to find it leveled.

_ And if it is, it will not be the end,  _ she told herself in her heart.  _ Because you aren’t about preserving the old, or propping up systems that can’t stand. You’re about rebuilding. Making better. Using the new instead of rejecting it. We will define ourselves, not let the ancient dead define our limits. _

Satine turned and strode to the ladder, feeling the rumble of the engines through the floor panels.

A pleasant tingle of excitement traced up her spine.

Her father had drilled it into her to live for adventure. She now felt that there was more to life than scrabbling to survive and spilling as much blood as you could, but that philosophical decision couldn’t begin to touch the deeply-ingrained instinct of her forebears and her own immersive cultural conditioning.

An outsider adult able to sense the sudden rush in her blood might interpret it as an untried child excited when they should be focused and ready, so Satine took a deep breath to even her pulse and rein in her mind.

She set down her pack against the wall, and climbed into the cockpit.

There she found four seats, two already filled.

Qui-Gon sat in the copilot’s seat, and his companion in the pilot’s.

_ My first guess would be another Jedi, though they could be some form of companion, I suppose. An Antarian Ranger, perhaps. _

She didn’t know much about the Rangers, but she was _ aware _ of them. Beings outside the Order, both Force-sensitive and Force-deaf alike, who tried to live their lives by the Jedi code, and gave their time to trying to help the Jedi in their colossal task of peacekeeping in a galaxy with countless systems, let alone worlds.

Satine wasn’t sure what the Jedi code actually  _ was,  _ all of her research had turned up nothing solid on that point, just rumors, but whatever it might be, both Jedi and Rangers tried to follow it, and that commitment had led the ancient collection of planets known as the Republic out of the dark ages and into a time where science and reason could expand and thrive.

“Ready?” Qui-Gon glanced up at her.

She gave him a nod and sat in the seat closest to her— the one directly behind the pilot. Even as she fastened the crash webbing she realized she should have taken the seat behind Qui-Gon’s. That might have given her a chance to see the mysterious individual in action.

Whoever, whatever the cloaked stranger might be, excellent pilot had to make the list somewhere. Guiding the ship up out of the atmosphere and into the short hyperspace jump to Draboon wouldn’t normally take much skill, but this time it required ducking beneath the vigilant armies’ notice.

Draboon orbited the same star as Mandalore, but was smaller and farther away. There was only one reason for people to live on Draboon instead of the far more habitable Mandalore and her moon with their forests and fields.

The lapis.

Some of the best quality lapis in the galaxy was to be found on Draboon, and as a result, mining and shipping colonies had arisen.

So far, the conflict over the problem of Mand’alor hadn’t yet reached Draboon. The people who lived there were miners, not mercenaries, and they answered to their own provincial leaders, not the current Mand’alor.

Then again, the Mand’alor usually didn’t care what they were doing. They weren’t mining beskar, after all.

From Satine’s point of view, Qui-Gon must have done  _ more  _ than a simple survey of her system’s planets, since he knew exactly where he wanted them to land.

They passed into the atmosphere far from any of the tiny communities, and continued unchallenged— and probably undetected— to the surface.

While Kalevala’s surface was covered in toxic deserts, Draboon’s terrain was much closer to Mandalore’s, with vast expanses of forest and hostile grasslands.

“My plan is to hide the ship, and then strike out on our own,” Qui-Gon explained.

Satine was just fine with that.

She climbed back down the ladder, lifted her pack, and glanced back at Qui-Gon, who’d followed her. “What did you bring to carry?”

“Only this,” Qui-Gon returned, hoisting a pack to his back and handing another to the cloaked figure, who took it in silence.

_ Perhaps this one’s mute _ , Satine mused. Or an alien who couldn’t speak Basic, but understood it.

That made her smile.

Waaay too short to be a Wookiee.

They reached the ground, Qui-Gon unfolding a sensor-obscuring net to place over the ship. Satine reached out to help when both offworlders stiffened, then looked to the sky.

“Hurry— then into the trees!” Qui-Gon barked.

They wrestled the netting over the ship and magnetically sealed the gripping points to the hull before breaking into a run.

Satine couldn’t hear anything over their pounding footsteps, and knew better than to try to look up at the sky from here. To look back or up was to trip, and in a pursuit, lost moments, a broken ankle, or even a sprained one, could make the difference between life and death.

Qui-Gon paused as soon as they passed under the canopy of the trees.

Satine pulled up beside him. “What is it?”  
“Your pursuers.”  
Satine listened, but the sound of the ships were not yet audible to un-enhanced human ears. She put on her helmet, checking the sensors.

Interesting. Kom’rk-class ships just now entering her scanner’s range, but the Jedi had known trouble to be coming  _ before  _ that.

“They probably spotted the ship before we got the net on,” the hooded figure murmured.

_ So it  _ can  _ talk. _

The voice was young. Male. Without Qui-Gon’s heavy accent.

In fact...

_ Could he be Mandalorian? _

“They were probably close enough,” Qui-Gon agreed. “They’re closer than I thought. We have to get deep and hide our trails.”

“I’m sorry, Master. I thought I’d gotten us out undetected.”

“You did your best. Let’s go.”

_ A Jedi in training, then? _

Satine’s comlink crackled to life. “Kryze. Kryze? The summer cottage was just bombed. I’m not sure by who yet. We’ll find out.”

“Is everyone alive?” she demanded back, striding into the forest.

“We were clear of the area. Don’t worry about us,” the voice came back, just slightly amused. “They might come looking for you wherever you are. Oya, Sat’ika. Come back alive.”

“You too. And that’s an order.” She clicked off the comm and glanced at Qui-Gon. “Looks like you arrived at the right moment. If they  _ do  _ find the ship, they  _ will  _ find we started in this direction, since it would be madness to take off across an open field with possible pursuit. Have you any practice in evading Mandos?”

“I have some. Obi-Wan, not yet.”

Ah-ha. So the silent one had a  _ name  _ too.

“I assume the original plan was to find some habitable place near the ship?” Satine checked.

“The first plan, yes.”

“We’ll have to work as if it’s useless now until we know for sure if we got the freighter covered in time,” Satine directed. “We saw a stream when we were coming in. It’s east of us now— let’s go.”

Qui-Gon glanced back behind them, then picked up his pace. “Any tips on how to make our path obscured?”

Oh, did she.

 


	3. Chapter 3

 

It was hours before they took a break to rest.

Satine hadn’t been sure how her suggestions would be received, but it wasn’t in her nature to keep quiet if she knew a way that might allow them a better chance of survival.

Jinn seemed to welcome her understanding of Mandalorian ways and plantlife.

Satine knew what prey did that made them catchable.

Jinn recognized the predator in her and didn’t seem to feel threatened by her experience with the land and people.

It was Jinn who called the halt for a brief rest. Satine couldn’t argue. By now, the hunt would be turning into an endurance trek instead of a race of speed. It would hardly be wise for the prey to push too hard too fast, risking exhaustion and mistakes.

And if they were going to rest, Satine had every intention of taking advantage of the situation.

After one last check of her scanners and scopes, Satine removed her helmet and sat down. It took but a moment to snag a hydration capsule from her belt, and a strip of gihaal— that hadn’t been ground— from her pack.

The smaller Jedi huddled into a cloaked pile on the ground, head down, hood dipping low over his face. He was neither stretching his muscles in preparation for the hunt ahead, nor regaining his energy reserves by eating and rehydration.

Satine’s eyebrow flicked up in surprise.

Well. If he had no intention of keeping his most lethal weapon, his own body,  _ honed...  _ he could at least satisfy her curiosity.

“Your name is Obi-Wan?”

 

* * *

 

Obi-Wan sat in grim silence, uninterested in food, and so refusing to eat.

He couldn’t quite decide what bothered him most. The fact that Yoda and Qui-Gon were so quick to break the rules after so thoroughly squashing his attempt to do the same, or the fact that Qui-Gon was pretending this was some great magnanimous mission

when Obi-Wan suspected the  _ indeterminate  _ amount of time granted Kryze was simply because Qui-Gon wanted to keep Obi-Wan away from Siri for an  _ indeterminate  _ amount of time.

After all, there was no way the two young adults could possibly run into one another in the forests of of Draboon.

Obi-Wan Kenobi was angry. Certainly.

He and Siri hadn’t been hurting anyone. They certainly hadn’t given less than their all to the mission because of their feelings for one another. They’d kept focused, had succeeded,  _ and  _ survived against impressive odds.

Siri Tachi.

Beautiful. Fiery.

The sensation of her hand tucked in his. Of looking deep into her eyes, and seeing something he’d never seen there before: shy uncertainty, mixed with eagerness.

And then, out of the blue, Yoda had waylaid him in the Room of a Thousand Fountains and told him he had to cut off this new discovery. Qui-Gon had arrived, and the two of them had completely smashed Obi-Wan’s dream-bubble.

The fact that Qui-Gon had  _ pledged  _ himself to Tahl just a few short years before only made the whole confrontation nastier.

Of course, when the nineteen-year-old brought up the now-dead Tahl, Qui-Gon had said he’d made a mistake, but...

_ Easy to say that years after her death,  _ Obi-Wan mused, feeling bitter.

Siri herself hadn’t helped matters. He’d tried to speak with her, point out that after they were knights, what they did with their hearts and bodies was their own business so long as they managed love without attachment, if they could just hold on until their knighting—

She’d cut him off. They were both somewhere between five and seven years away from knighthood, and she didn’t  _ want  _ to spend those years pining for him. She told him it would be easier for her to move on and forget if they didn’t say goodbye. Told him not to be  _ clingy. _

She walked away without a backwards glance, leaving him standing there, heart full of knowledge she would never let him  _ speak— _

Frustrated didn’t begin to describe it. Hurt, confused, humiliated— didn’t she  _ care  _ for him like he did her? Why did the truth ring through the Force when she pushed him away?

Qui-Gon expected him to be courteous to everyone, especially politicians.

To ignore  _ this  _ young politician’s question would be considered inexcusable behavior.

Well...

Maybe Qui-Gon would just have to be disappointed this time.

Obi-Wan pretended he hadn’t heard Kryze.

Having to watch over her was going to be a royal pain in any event, and he certainly wasn’t going to go out of his way to curry her favor.

 

* * *

 

Qui-Gon knew Obi-Wan to still be upset. The boy had been almost completely silent ever since the confrontation in the Room of a Thousand Fountains. Passive aggression from the apprentice had marked their time together. Each request from Qui-Gon was carried out so meticulously it almost reached the point of absurdity.

Eventually, Qui-Gon knew, Obi-Wan would realize Siri was the one who, instead of choosing to slow down, had simply thrown him out. Qui-Gon certainly didn’t have the power to compel Siri to do such a thing, even if he had wanted to.

And he certainly hadn’t.

The question was just how long it would take for Obi-Wan to realize it.

Qui-Gon had intended on letting his apprentice have his space, but as Obi-Wan continued to ignore Satine’s entirely reasonable question, Qui-Gon decided it had gone quite far enough. It was one thing for Obi-Wan to silently protest what he felt to be an injustice from his master. It was something else entirely to drag others into the same mess.

“I’m sorry,” Qui-Gon spoke, careful to keep his outward expression and tone free of any disapproval of Obi-Wan’s behavior.

But in the Force, he impressed upon his padawan his displeasure.

Obi-Wan turned his head away from them both.

“It completely slipped my mind to introduce you,” Qui-Gon explained, smoothly. “Satine Kryze, this is my padawan, Obi-Wan Kenobi.”

“Well met,” Satine offered, polite and frank.

Still the apprentice did not respond.

Qui-Gon’s jaw tightened.

This... might end up being a very miserable mission.

 

* * *

 

_ Is he just taciturn, or is there something about  _ me  _ personally?  _ Satine sank one of her canines into the fish jerky and ripped. The force it required worked both the muscles of her jaw and the back of her neck. Chewing the mouthful would take a while.  _ Maybe someone important to him was killed by Mandalorians, and he’s unhappy with having to help me now. _

It would be reasonable. And entirely plausible.

Her kind hunted his, after all.

When Jinn arose and thereby signaled it was time to move again, Satine certainly didn’t mind putting her effort into something other than peering at the shrouded figure and wondering questions he probably wouldn’t answer.

They hiked until the afternoon sank close to evening, and after over an hour of keeping an eye out for a suitable camping place, Satine found one.

“A fire would be unwise at this point, as well as a classic shelter,” Satine announced, looking around.

The swift-flowing creek they had begun to hear a while ago was visible here, falling from a rock outcropping, forming a small pool before continuing on its path. Near the waterfall, a depression had formed in the stone wall.

Not only would it provide shelter from above and three approaches, it was also not visible from above— the direction from which any pursuit would be headed.

While Satine would prefer not to have the noise of the creek as a potential cover for an enemy’s approach, she also recognized it would help cover any noise she and the Jedi might make.

It wasn’t an insurmountable issue.

_ We’ll just keep vigilant. _

Satine’s glance shifted back to Obi-Wan. She was surprised he had withstood the heat all day. Late summer had most  _ certainly  _ not given way to fall, and yet the padawan had kept his hood drawn up and his head down all day.

As if hiding his face might be more important than comfort and speed. It had to be miserable in there.

Jinn had early on stored his own cloak in his pack, but had made no move to suggest his apprentice do the same. In fact, he’d only rarely spoken to the boy at all.

Satine stepped into the almost-cave and pulled off her pack, allowing it to sink to the floor by the wall.

While she didn’t  _ need  _ the bathing option the creek offered, she rather liked the thought of the cool water after such a keen hunt.

Besides. Even if  _ Satine  _ might be comfortable going without water contact for long periods of time, her guests might  _ not  _ be comfortable with her doing so. The padawan seemed a bit sensitive.

Satine carefully stretched out her legs, back, and arms. She might not be the  _ hunter  _ on this hunt— and wasn’t  _ that  _ an odd feeling— but she intended to care for her weapons and armor as if she still held her rightful place in the order of things.

While she removed her helmet, gauntlets, and jetpack, she kept the rest of the armor in place.

Satine pulled her medium-length blond hair out of its flat bun, the locks sweat-streaked in her hands. “Are you Jedi as skin fearful as rumor has it?” Satine asked.

Qui-Gon looked both surprised and amused. “Certainly not. However, it might be wise to bathe in turns, so that someone is always armed and on alert at any given time. Why take risks in bathing one wouldn’t in sleeping?”

_ I think I like you. _

She turned to go, and came face-to-face with what had to be Obi-Wan.

He had rolled his cloak up under one arm, and his pack hung from the other hand. Satine’s practiced eye took in useful information within the space of a heartbeat.

His face wasn’t as chiseled as the average bloodline Mandalorian, but his very short hair was fair, and his eyes a clear blue. There was a dent in his chin, and a line carved between his eyebrows, an expression of grim unhappiness in his face, though the noncommittal curve of his lips, and the relaxed muscles of his jaw suggested he was trying to hide it.

But his eyes confirmed what Satine read in his forehead.

Just the tiniest hint of a flash of something intense.

He was upset.

A padawan braid wrapped in blue and yellow thread fell just below his shoulder, and a short tail of hair was bound at the back of his head. His robes were of a similar cut and tan shades as his master’s, but had a completely different appearance to them. These had been carefully measured, and fit him perfectly, all the edges and seams where they were supposed to fall, while Qui-Gon’s tunics looked more haphazard.

Neither young adult paused as they passed one another, and Satine’s gaze had rested on him for only a moment, and then one more as she glanced as his back as they continued on.

Four standard seconds.

And yet Satine knew she could draw an accurate portrait of him, one so close that any fairly-observant witness would be able to recognize the representation and tell her if they’d seen him. She knew his height, his build, his approximate weight, and the construction of his fingers and hands, and with seven seconds more she would have known his gait and therefore type of footprints he would leave.

Satine smiled slightly to herself as she continued on to the waterfall.

She’d evaluated him as prey by instinct, the way she evaluated every creature she encountered. She didn’t have to  _ decide  _ to do so, it simply happened.

_ Though it is highly unlikely I will ever  _ hunt  _ Padawan Kenobi,  _ Satine mused. Which was actually a bit of a regretful thought. She liked the thought of him running like a shatual doe, wide-eyed, graceful, hunted.

_ And of the most important points of today, wanting the little Jedi is definitely not one. _

She sent a last glance in the direction of the master.

Qui-Gon stood with his hands on his hips, looking out at the trees, an expression of subdued frustration on his face.

_ All is not right between them. _

Jinn sensed her gaze, looked to her. “It is a beautiful land.”

Satine wouldn’t argue with that. She had yet to see an ugly landscape in her home system’s assortment of planets and moons. Flooded with life, crawling with predator and prey alike...

She completed the short journey, releasing the seal of her kute— the black fabric between her skin and armor— as she went. That accomplished, when she stepped into the pool, the cold water slipped in at her ankles, soothing the well-worked muscles.

Satine didn’t take long, not liking the sensation of being without even small parts of her armor while not within the safety of a friendly stronghold.

Cleaning the last of the blood from the plates and then wringing out her hair, Satine hauled herself out of the water and prowled back to the cave.

Her counterpart sat with his back against a boulder, staring off into the woods, moodily tearing a leaf into tiny pieces.

Satine considered first his scraped together pile of leaves and twigs, then the tiny secondary pile of shredded organic matter, then finally his face.

And felt her insides lean in his direction. Again.

It made her smirk, that inclination towards this beautiful creature’s looks. She already knew the padawan fit a few of her tastes.

They would see about the rest.

 

* * *

 

Obi-Wan felt his stomach flip over, alarms ringing in his gut.

He watched as the Mandalorian passed into the cave, her attention no longer on him...

There was something not right about her.

His master’s voice interrupted his attempt to figure out what. “Obi-Wan, you next.”

Stifling a sigh, Obi-Wan traveled to the side of the creek, then hesitated.

He looked back, saw Qui-Gon’s gaze sweeping potential points of attack, and the Mandalorian was out of sight in the cave. 

Still, Obi-Wan hesitated.

He wasn’t skin shy— at least, he didn’t think so. Certainly not around other Jedi.

But... he wasn’t sure what he’d sensed from the Mandalorian, and that made him uncomfortable. He wasn’t sure it was a  _ friendly  _ thing. Unbidden, the histories of what her kind had done to his for thousands of years resurfaced.

He pulled off tunics, boots, and leggings, but kept his undershorts. He held his lightsaber for a long moment, crouching to place it on the pile of his clothes, feeling reluctant to set it down and move into the water.

_ You’re not scared, are you? _

But  _ should  _ he be?

Obi-Wan closed his eyes, reaching out to the Force, trying to reach both its aspects: the Living and the Cosmic.

As usual, the Living was difficult for him to discern. He could feel the rocks beneath his feet, see the Light nearby that was Qui-Gon Jinn, could tell there was a third person, the Mandalorian, but he could not discern anything of her intentions, for good or ill.

He thought he’d caught a brief glimpse of lust earlier, but if it was still there, it was somehow hidden.

Obi-Wan didn’t quite understand how that could be. She didn’t have the Force.

While the Living Force eluded his reaching mind, the Cosmic Force rushed in, just as it always had, to fill his senses.

And while he couldn’t read what Satine’s present might be, the Cosmic smacked him with absolute  _ surety. _

Satine Kryze? Was a being covered in blood. Obi-Wan couldn’t tell if it had been innocent or guilty, but in the Force the crimson flickering was thicker around her than even many of the criminals Obi-Wan had helped Qui-Gon bring into custody.

Whispers of  _ awful  _ things lurked around her, and Obi-Wan didn’t think they’d been done  _ to  _ her.

At the same time, he heard an echo of himself sobbing, a moment he had not yet to experience, and a wave of turbulent emotion surged through his system, widening his eyes and making his teeth grit.

Just as swiftly as the torrent of information, past and future raged in, it fell silent, leaving Obi-Wan curled in on himself, a bead of sweat rolling down his forehead.

“Padawan?”

Obi-Wan looked up to see Qui-Gon crouched beside him, clearly concerned.

“I’m fine,” Obi-Wan mumbled, but he knew it for the lie it was.

“Remember the Cosmic Force does not heed any particular direction of time,” Qui-Gon warned. “Whatever you sensed may have already happened, or might never take place.”

Obi-Wan felt he had fairly good reason to believe the overwhelming  _ care  _ and  _ despair  _ he’d just felt himself experience hadn’t been in his past somewhere. And the darkness that swirled around Satine Kryze felt similar, it had that same vibration that past knowledge carried.

He didn’t bother to try to explain that to Qui-Gon, knowing he would receive a blank attempt to understand, but it was like trying to explain  _ taste  _ to a creature who only experienced  _ texture.  _ Qui-Gon Jinn was powerful and had tremendous experience with the Living Force, but his only knowledge of the Cosmic Force was theory.

_ At some point, some time in my life, I have loved Satine Kryze. _

To the Cosmic Force, it had already happened. It was just as true as Obi-Wan kneeling here now, trembling.

There was such an undercurrent of  _ pain  _ in that emotion, along with something Obi-Wan had felt only rarely in the past. A sense of being happy for someone’s joy, even while knowing that joy would bring pain to yourself.

The intensity was unlike anything Obi-Wan had ever experienced before.

_ I... I love Siri,  _ he thought, feeling miserable. But this... this was nothing like that. And it made him wonder.

He wasn’t sure he wanted to feel for this alarming Mandalorian what the Force said he  _ did  _ someday. He wasn’t sure he wanted to feel that way about anyone at  _ all. _

The happy, uncomfortable skip of a heartbeat, the blush he couldn’t prevent, the warmth in his fingers while holding another’s hand—  _ that  _ didn’t hold this consuming abyss of something Obi-Wan didn’t think he even had words for. This was something  _ else  _ entirely _ . _

“The future is always moving,” Qui-Gon murmured, a hand on his back, the gesture an attempt at comfort. “Whatever you felt, you can still choose your own destiny.”

Qui-Gon believed that, with all his heart.

_ But do I? _

Obi-Wan didn’t know.

 


	4. Chapter 4

 

Want.

Hunt.

Obtain.

Figuring out what to do was rarely _complicated_ within the Mandalorian culture.

Satine checked each one of her armor ’s systems and all of her weapons, the routine comfortable while her ponderings might not be.

_ But I’ve added another step. _

_Calculate._

Click, click, clack-swish—

_Do I want to get into a relationship of any sort with a Jedi?_ Actually  _want it, not just, oh there go the instincts and hormones and hungers?_

That one was easy.

No.

She did  _not._

Satine had come to a place where she respected their choice and path, she didn ’t despise them anymore, had realized that holding on to a hatred of them simply because her parents had, and theirs before them, and on down the miserable path of dead people... seemed pointless.

But Satine had enough issues to deal with _without_ having a Jedi lover. At least right now, when some of her people claimed she wasn’t even Mandalorian anymore, it was because of her _ideas,_ not because she’d _done_ something like _that._

_ I still put my people first. _

She slipped her blaster back into its holster, began checking her left vambrace.

_ You’re just lonely _ , she decided of herself.  _ And he’s the first young man your age in recent days to not look at you in derision because you are different from the rest. _

It had been two years since she’d last had a lay. The male she’d had then... she’d thought him reliable, until she admitted to her shifting views. He’d left, spitting on her boots— _how dare she suggest Kryzes and Caderas had better things to do than killing one another._

She had felt quite strongly for him, and his disowning had certainly hurt. But  _ not  _ hurt enough to dally with a Jedi, when that could  _ only  _ have far-reaching,  _ disastrous  _ implications for her future.

_ I am going to find a son of Mandalore for me. One who can accompany me on hunts and keep up, one who loves the same things I love. _

That was what she wanted, and she deserved to have it.

_ I refuse to settle for a little Jedi’s shebs. _

 

* * *

 

Qui-Gon had left him to watch the camp.

Obi-Wan found the water too cold to be enjoyable, so he minimized his time spent in it, and began working his way back into his clothes before his skin had fully dried.

He felt miserable, empty, and trapped. Qui-Gon described the Force as liberating and soothing, but hell if that had been Obi-Wan’s experience.

_I probably just don’t know enough. I’m not good enough at this yet._

Maybe then the Force wouldn’t whisper _awful_ things in his ear, like some cruel creature from a holovid.

_ I get to have a life, right? One where I can be me, do some real good in the galaxy, and then retire in the Temple and doze my days away in the company of a good book? _

He returned, stood watch while Qui-Gon bathed— and that took even less time than for Obi-Wan— and then tried to pay attention while his master and their charge planned out the near future, even sketching out possibilities for beyond that, just in case—

But Obi-Wan couldn’t clear Siri’s face from his mind, and he wasn’t sure he  _ wanted  _ to.

Satine’s blond edged towards white, while Siri’s was a rich gold. Their eyes were different shades of blue. Satine had a bit thinner build.

Siri was Jedi to the core. If he ignored the bullying that had happened early on.

Satine was...

Something else.

There had been moments during the intense hiking that the word  _ predator  _ had come forcibly to his mind, yet when she met Qui-Gon’s gaze and discussed strategy, she didn’t seem  _ threatening,  _ like she wanted to harm  _ them. _

Right this minute, her eyes were shockingly cold and calculating as she listened to Qui-Gon’s ideas and studied maps they had strewn on the stone-and-dirt floor.

Qui-Gon had insisted on bringing actual physical maps, not just datapads.

Obi-Wan  _ knew  _ all of this might be important, but he just couldn’t bring himself to care. Every gesture, every  _ word  _ of Satine’s just kept reminding him how she  _ wasn’t _ Siri, and how he wished it  _ was  _ Siri  _ here  _ instead of  _ wherever  _ she might be. 

According to the files they’d studied on the way to Mandalore, Satine Kryze had been raised in the traditional Mandalorian way. Obi-Wan had only vague ideas as to what that actually meant, but so far she seemed to fit.

A killer. Would do just about anything for money.

_ Or, in this case, power. She wants to be in charge. _

Obi-Wan didn’t understand  _ why  _ Qui-Gon would insist on propping up  _ one  _ leader over others on these miserable, Force-forsaken worlds.

Mandalorians  _ hated  _ Jed,  _ hunted  _ Jedi.

Obi-Wan couldn’t see how any of this could come to something  _ good. _

And the Force had even  _ more  _ awful ideas that he just wasn’t going to pay attention to right now.

He felt things for Siri, dammit.

 

* * *

 

Kenobi offered to take first watch, and Satine claimed second.

Sitting awake with the two Jedi sound asleep, Satine kept her attention stretched around them, watching for anything, sentient or not, that might offer threat.

That didn’t keep her from taking glances back every once in a while, noting how the padawan looked in sleep, cloak bundled around him and knees drawn up, his face not hidden, and seeming just a bit mournful in slumber.

Honestly, the only interesting thing to happen until Jinn took over and she lay down to sleep, was Kenobi’s face.

Morning?

Was an entirely different matter.

Jinn felt antsy, wanted to put more distance between them and the ship, not liking how the Force felt.

He set out to scent different potential directions, asking the other two to wait and remain vigilant.

That ended in a stathas looping around Kenobi’s leg and trying to drag him into the bushes.

Obi-Wan’s reaction was a frightened attempt to get away. Kicking against it, pushing—

_ You have a  _ lightsaber,  _ dikut! _ Satine lunged forward, the stathas moving too erratically for her to put a bolt  _ definitely  _ in its head and not in some part of the flailing Kenobi, so it was a blade through the side of the skull that had the reptile collapsing onto the padawan.

Wide eyed, Obi-Wan pulled himself free and skittered backwards.

“Why didn’t you kill it  _ first  _ and  _ then  _ try to get away?” Satine demanded.

He sent her a shocked look. “It wasn’t  _ evil—  _ it’s an animal. I probably went too near its nest or something. I didn’t want to  _ kill  _ it if I could manage, I just didn’t want it to maul me.” He looked down at his hands and tunics, now stained with dark crimson.

“ _ That’s _ where you went wrong.”

An eyebrow arched, and a glimmer of defiance formed in his eye as he looked to her again. “ _ Oh _ ?”

“When something is trying to kill you, a switch needs to flip in your brain. Instead of the mind-killing desire to  _ get away,  _ you need a consuming will to  _ hurt them.  _ To inflict as much  _ devastating  _ damage as possible.”

“Yeah?” Kenobi challenged. “You use that on  _ people  _ too?”  
“Of course.” Was he damaged? The stathas hadn’t bit him, she would have seen it, so he wasn’t poisoned and dying—

Obi-Wan sneered. “ _ Really. _ ”

“You think feebly slapping or pushing at the face of the being  _ throttling  _ you is going to do  _ osik  _ to save your life? They can’t stop your fingers since their hands are occupied, so  _ gouge out their eyeballs.  _ And if it’s a  _ stathas,  _ which are  _ venomous,  _ you don’t stop to ask  _ pardon  _ for going too near its  _ nest! _ ”

“I think you’re all talk.”

That was insulting.

“Do you think my tally marks are from killing  _ animals _ ?” 

His gaze snapped to her upper arms, where dark blue scores in the matte black beskar offered knowledge to anyone who looked close enough to discern the thin navy lines.

Then his gaze faltered, he looked away, and the confrontational affect disappeared. In its place, something troubled lurked.

“Have you killed?” Satine asked, wondering if that might be the source of his discomfort.

“Yes.”

That nearly sick, haunted look about him—

“It’s eating you up inside,” Satine realized, bewildered.

He shot her a grim look. “It’s  _ supposed  _ to. If it feels  _ good,  _ it’s a warning sign to yourself. One of the few hints a being ever receives that they’re becoming a monster.”

Was it, now? Satine kept her expression even, pondering his clear trauma.

“And what do you think I am?” she asked at last.

He shivered, looked away. “I think you experience no remorse for all the blood on your hands. I think you like it.”

“You’re a Jedi, a warrior, and yet you take issue with being a killer?”

“Tell me this. You say you want your people to stop killing each other, but does that mean  _ you  _ want to stop killing? Or just to kill someone  _ else _ ?”  
It sounded like a trap, felt like a trap, but Satine couldn’t see where the snare might be.

“Of course I crave blood. Doesn’t everyone?”

His eyes widened and he looked nearly more frightened of  _ her  _ than he had been of the stathas— and she currently meant  _ him  _ no harm!

“No. I wish I’d never done it. I hope I never have to again.”

“You are the strangest person I have ever met.” Satine shrugged, scooped up her helmet, and settled it over her head.

Fighting one stathas without it today was  _ quite  _ enough.

 

* * *

 

Obi-Wan could feel a trembling in his hands and arms. He didn’t know if Kryze could see it, but there was nothing he could do to stop it.

_ She doesn’t even deny thirsting for blood. _

Though, really...

It wasn’t seen as a bad thing where she was raised. Murder was just what they  _ did. _

_ Master, why are we protecting her? _

Would it really be so bad if she kept on her vicious way and then ended up stopped by a weapon of one of her own?

_ Do we  _ want  _ Mandalore united? Seems the last time that happened, it was  _ bad. _ Bad for everybody but them and the Sith. _

_ Qui-Gon and I could be creating the very army that will plunge the galaxy back into war and slaughter or enslave us all. _

He didn’t want to be here, and it wasn’t  _ just  _ because of Siri anymore.

_ I’m scared, Master. Please,  _ please  _ can we leave? _

 

* * *

 

Satine was trying to puzzle through if the fear of the padawan was that he  _ did  _ experience bloodlust and didn’t want to admit it— though what bizarre desire would that be— or he that truly  _ didn’t  _ experience feral joy in killing, in the warmth of blood against skin, in the scent of the death of an enemy...

_ In which case, maybe there is something broken inside him? _

She was aware that Jedi throughout history continuously stepped in the way of Mandalore’s armies conquering various worlds, which was why the Mandalorian people  _ hated  _ them.

_ Though I can almost see the point. It is rather ridiculous to feel insulted someone chooses to protect a place not their own. _ Mandalorians did it too, sometimes, of course. For money. Jedi did it for...

Ideals? They were good at convincing people to talk to one another and find a truce or alliance situation where there had been conflict before, but...

_ Could it be that they don’t kill because they don’t  _ want  _ to kill? _

Killing seemed to have  _ damaged  _ this one, left him doubtful and hurting.

“So this kill you made. Was it an ally?” Perhaps a case of mistaken identity?

Of course, it  _ happens,  _ things like that. Not much that can be done afterw—

“No. He was in the process of killing one of my friends, and he was threatening to kill me.”

Satine waited, but he seemed to think that  _ was  _ the explanation. “I’m missing something here. It  _ didn’t _ leave you floating in delight?”

“How the  _ frip  _ did you convince Yoda you were worth  _ help _ ?” Obi-Wan nearly yelped, recoiling away from her.

Satine scowled.  _ Here I’m trying to understand you, and it turns into a slur against my competence. _ “I fight for my people,  _ jet’ika.  _ That is why I am worth being helped. I want to learn a skill none of my people can teach me, so I will learn it from the best, even if there are  _ thousands  _ of years of reasons to not bother.  _ That  _ is why your ruler Yoda chose to help me. I would have preferred if Jinn had not brought the dead weight, but I’ll keep saving your firm little shebs, if that’s the price to learn the secret of winning a battle with words.”

“Shebs?” His voice rose. “My shebs are not  _ small! _ ”

A laugh wanted to explode out of Satine, but instead she stood there, staring at him, very still, and experiencing glee that was borderline on euphoric. “It isn’t, huh?” was all she said, not sure she wanted to give away she’d been referring to his ass, not... what he’d assumed.

_ An  _ s  _ in Mando’a does not a plural make. _

Qui-Gon stepped back out of the trees, saber in his hand. “Are we under attack?”

Kenobi looked to him as if he might be the most  _ obtuse  _ being he’d ever had the misfortune of meeting.

“Not anymore.” Satine gestured a thumb at the corpse, and then nodded at the blood staining Obi-Wan. “None of that’s his, don’t worry. I kept him alive.”

“I appreciate that.” Jinn looked a bit quizzical to his padawan, but the younger Jedi sank into a sulk. “I think I found the direction we should go in.”

Satine tapped her helmet. “Lead on, Jinn.”

 

* * *

 

Obi-Wan found himself assailed by shivers, in spite of the air not being cold, and their brisk walking.

Much as he tried to veer his thoughts away, he found them tangled up in Bant’s fear, her desperation, and Bruck.

The feel of Bruck’s arms holding him tight, Obi-Wan trying to wrench himself away, the hiss of sabers, the roar of the waterfall, Bant  _ trapped  _ underwater, with the cleaning solution scoring through the system, a solution that would wreck her lungs, leaving her to drown in blood, even while surrounded by water she could normally breathe.

Breaking free, Bruck’s foot slipping—

Harsh, shrill thirteen-year-old voices screaming at one another—

_ “Take my hand! Bruck!” _

Bruck’s wide eyes, his terror—

Falling—

The way the Force twisted and went silent as he hit the bottom.

The way his head lay flopped, neck clearly broken—

The pound of Obi-Wan’s heartbeat, so desperate it hurt—

Had to get to Bant, get Bant out of there, get her  _ out— _

Vomiting uncontrollably, Bant being rushed to the Healers—

“Padawan.”

Obi-Wan’s gaze slid over to find his master.

“Stay here, with us. In the now.” Qui-Gon pulled back, letting Kryze take the lead, and drew close to his struggling padawan. “You’ve had therapy since then. Remember it, remember the time you are in now.”

Obi-Wan swallowed back bile.

_ It was not my fault. Trying to save Bant was good. It was good. And I tried to save Bruck. I didn’t want to kill him. I wasn’t trying to. It was an accident. _

And if Bruck had succeeded in murdering Bant, that would  _ not  _ have been an accident.

“There you are,” Qui-Gon murmured, sounding both mournful and proud. “There you are.”

_ If I were a better Jedi, I wouldn’t get stuck in moments of the past, or the future. I would just be where I am now.  _

Obi-Wan squared his shoulders.  _ I did not murder Bruck Chun. I did not like it when he died. I am not a monster. _

His gaze found the black armor moving ahead of them.

_ I am not like her. _

 

* * *

 

Satine allowed for privacy between the two, killing her helmet’s external mic for a bit.

The pretty little Jedi was brain injured. Satine didn’t know if he’d been born defective, or if he’d  _ become  _ damaged, but there was something not quite battle-ready about him.

Jinn seemed to love him, and there were lingering traces that they both had trusted one another implicitly at one point, no matter how strained things might be now.

_ Is it the kill he made? Or something else? _

She suspected it was the kill. He’d been alarmed by the reptile, not terrified.

_ Certainly not frightened enough to survive long in the wild on his own. _

Hopefully Jinn had better reflexes, and cared less about whether what was attacking  _ deserved  _ to die or not.

_ It comes after me? It dies. _

That was her rule, and she would not be bending it to soothe a squeamish, if desirable, little Jedi.

 

 


	5. Chapter 5

 

Something was definitely wrong.

The birds had gone quiet.

When Satine held up her hand, had the other two stand still and silent, and dialed up her audio sensors, the hush’s radius was  _ wide.  _ Wider than she could pick up.

She switched her view to heat signatures, the two Jedi blazing red in her sight. Sweeping the trees, she saw blue-green callsigns of various birds,  _ present,  _ just silent. She heard a shatual hind snort, blowing air through its nose, located it, purple, nearby.

No threats.

Yet.

She turned to Jinn, saw his tension. The young one looked miserable, but not particularly alarmed.

“We don’t know if people found our ship, if we’re even being followed,” Kenobi whispered.

Jinn placed a hand on his shoulder, gripping tight, silencing him.

_ Even a nine-year-old would have more sense than him, with his decade extra of life. _

How was he  _ alive _ still?

Must be Jinn. He’d adopted the waif, refused to let him die.

_ I need to not make the same mistake. _

It was the eyes. And the curve of the lip. And his size. And that copper-blond hair.

“We are being hunted,” Satine murmured, her voice emerging quiet from her buy’ce. “But I cannot yet tell from what direction. I want to gain the high ground.”

Kenobi huffed a derisive snort, and Satine felt her temper flare hot and bright. She took a menacing step in his direction, scowling through her T-visor.

“You have something you want to say?” she challenged. “Maybe it’s never mattered to you, but in war, the army that has to fight  _ uphill  _ expends more resources than one  _ higher up. _ But you know nothing of warfare, do you. You simply like snickering at things you know nothing about.  _ Civilian. _ ”

Kenobi’s chest inflated, like a furious little bird ready to toss back a retort.

Jinn’s fingers on Kenobi’s shoulder snapped tighter to a point where the padawan’s eyes went wide and he shot a grumpy, bewildered look up at his master.

“I am not sure we have the time for going uphill. Could we begin the loop around, approach the clearing from the far side to reconnoiter?”

_ I don’t like not being able to see. _

_ Maybe  _ circling around would get them free of the hunters. Maybe not.

But veering off their path was a solid idea, so she gave Jinn a sharp nod and turned to go check over the little bluff behind them, just to be sure—

There.

Three marks.

 

* * *

 

The battle was swift, near silent.

Obi-Wan went from  _ done  _ to heart in his throat.

One enemy ended up with Satine’s fist in his faceplate, which Obi-Wan thought was a little ridiculous— why punch a place shielded with  _ armor  _ with finger bones that can  _ break _ ?— until he saw the body collapse, the plate shattered in, and blood draining out.

A knifeblade, short and harsh, and  _ covered,  _ now, extended from her gauntlet. He saw it retract, realized she’d hit, triggered it, and it had punched clear through visor, eye and bone, into brain. It had to have one hell of a spring behind it.

Obi-Wan caught glimpses as he deprived the man trying to kill him of both his hands, and kicked his knees in. Qui-Gon’s lay on the ground, injured in some way Obi-Wan couldn’t see.

Satine dropped beside the fallen warrior, pulled out a pretty bone-hilt knife, reached for the neck-seal—

“Hey!” Obi-Wan snapped. “What are you doing?”

“Killing them,” came back her voice, warped just a bit by the helmet.

Obi-Wan launched forward, slammed his lower leg, knee-to-ankle, against her side, sending her from a crouch into a sprawl on her back like some mantellian turtle. “We don’t kill prisoners!”

“They’ve seen that you are Jedi,” Satine bit out, and there was  _ surprise  _ and  _ shock  _ around her in the Force. “We can’t let them call back in to others who’d like to take your scalp!”

“That’s a myth,” Obi-Wan scorned.  _ What do you take me for? You think I’d just stand by and let you  _ murder  _ these people? _

“A  _ myth _ ?” Satine rasped, sounding almost choked.

Qui-Gon’s saber was still out but not lit, and he looked absent. Distracted. Before Satine could get out another word, he spoke up. “Obi-Wan. We need to check the perimeter.”

Obi-Wan turned wide eyes to him. “You trust her to not kill them?”

“Yes. Now come.” Qui-Gon sounded urgent, and an undercurrent of alarm whispered through his Force presence.

Obi-Wan obeyed, following him, only glancing back at Satine once, who had regained her defensive crouch, knife still in hand.

With trees and the hillock between them and the Mandalorians, Qui-Gon turned to face Obi-Wan, expression grave. He hooked his saber to his belt, and placed both hands on Obi-Wan’s shoulders.

“Obi-Wan,” he murmured, “she is killing them.”

Panic burst into being and Obi-Wan exploded into movement, trying to twist away, to go  _ do something—  _ “How can you  _ let— _ ”

Qui-Gon didn’t let go, instead dragging him forward and locking Obi-Wan in his arms. “Padawan. Be silent. Reach out, what do you sense?”

“Death,” he choked out, feeling them  _ die,  _ how could Qui-Gon—

“Farther out,” Qui-Gon whispered near Obi-Wan’s ear.

Obi-Wan cast out with the Force, found nothing. “There’s nothing—” He began to struggle free again.

The arms tightened, and Obi-Wan could feel Qui-Gon’s heart thundering.

_ He’s... frightened? _

“Look closer,” his master whispered.

Obi-Wan closed his eyes, went limp, focused—

And then his eyes snapped open and went wide, horror seizing him. “They’re  _ everywhere.  _ How are they  _ hiding _ ?”

“Their intent is veiled,” Qui-Gon replied, still so quiet, so still. “They’ve had thousands of years to perfect it. They’re our natural predators, Obi-Wan, and we are surrounded.”

 

* * *

 

Satine had the armor off the largest one, salvaged the helmet from another, ready for Jinn, when the two Jedi returned.

Kenobi stared down at the corpses in absolute revulsion.

“They can’t know you’re Jedi,” Satine directed. “Out of your clothes. You can keep undertunics and leggings and cloaks, nothing else. Put it all in the packs. Jinn, do you know armor?”

Qui-Gon crouched beside her. “Not really. This forest is crawling with enemies.”

“Yes.” Satine slipped the helmet off the smaller corpse, and Kenobi blanched as he caught sight of the small knife wound in the throat, and the blood turning the ground to mud.

She finished stripping the armor as the Jedi hid their extra clothes, and Jinn firmly took Kenobi’s saber away and hid both in the packs too.

“Those wounds are clearly saber-induced,” Jinn warned.

Satine grunted. “On it.”  
Two forearms, sliced clean.  _ Hm. _ She flicked the safety on her vambrace, blasted fire against the stumps, and then over the shorn hands on the ground.

Jinn was climbing into the beskar’gam as well as he could manage, and assisting his apprentice.

Satine surveyed the small, round impaling wound of the third dead man.

She took her gauntlet knife and slammed it into the same place, cracking the armor around it, then pressed the vambrace up, sent a stream of fire in.

_ Has to be enough. _

She latched the few pieces of armor the two Jedi had missed, then eased the padawan into the helmet.

“What is—?”

“Don’t worry about it, figure it out later. Can you see?”

He nodded.

“Then just leave everything the way it is. Come on.”

 

* * *

 

It closed him in.

Satine moved with such  _ ease,  _ like it was a second skin, but Obi-Wan felt closed off from the world around him by the armor, locked away.

His breathing sounded loud, assaulting his ears, and his field of vision was narrowed. In the areas where his peripheral vision might have been were displays, so many displays, holo gauges and—

A hand on his shoulder, muffled through the armor. Obi-Wan looked up, saw Qui-Gon’s face hidden by a helmet too.

“Live, Padawan. Let’s go.”

_ Is that why he let her kill those men? Because our position would be given away too fast otherwise? _

_So we would live?_

But was there any real way to know their position  _ hadn’t _ already been compromised, or would be within moments?

Satine was moving fast, and Qui-Gon was behind Obi-Wan, so he picked up his pace, trying to follow swift and silent.

He accomplished one of those things for sure.

 

* * *

 

They dodged other Mandos, hid and ran, then hid again.

Obi-Wan’s calves and thighs burned from so much crouching, and his heart still fluttered madly in his throat. The little chrono in the helmet said they’d been on the run for an hour.

For the first five minutes, he’d been able to hear comm chatter. People checking in, listing quadrants, and some variant on  _ no sign of them. _ There was also a lot of talking in the harsh language Obi-Wan couldn’t understand.

And then it had gone deathly silent.

_ I don’t think it’s because they suddenly have nothing to say. _

Given there had been no shouts...

_ I don’t think they found the corpses. I think the corpses failed to check in, and now they know there’s trouble. _

Whatever had happened, the Force swirled quiet and unhelpful, the Mandalorians difficult to read, difficult to locate.

They didn’t stop to rest, that evening.

Five-minute pauses occasionally happened, and when Satine pressed a hydration pill into his hand, Obi-Wan wrenched the helmet off and gladly took it, only to have Qui-Gon guiding that cage back over his head again, and pressing him forward once more.

Obi-Wan wasn’t sure how these people were different from others he and Qui-Gon had faced in the past, but Qui-Gon was unnerved. Flat-out  _ alarmed,  _ and that left Obi-Wan scared.

Every childhood myth he’d ever heard traded around by younglings and padawans paraded through his mind.

None of it was  _ true,  _ of course. Mandalorians presumably weren’t the savages that scary stories suggested. The history books certainly didn’t talk about things done to prisoners, and if it was  _ real,  _ it would have been discussed in class, wouldn’t it?

_ Qui-Gon let Kryze murder two men in cold blood. Just... knife their throats... _

What bothered Obi-Wan most was how silent it had been.

The men didn’t cry out, didn’t beg for mercy, showed no sign of humanity at all, and Satine...

No grunts, pants for breath, nothing, just...

A knife, slipped between the joints of armor.

And then nothing.

Obi-Wan shuddered.

The helmets coming off had revealed vacant, staring eyes.

Like Bruck’s.

_ I could have done more. I could have refused Qui-Gon’s direction. I could have stopped her. I— _

A hand held out again, a gesture Obi-Wan had learned meant take cover.

He slipped behind the closest tree, felt Qui-Gon’s chest against his back.

That comforting hand, again on his shoulder—

_For me, or you? You think we’re going to die here?_

On the bright side, if they  _ did,  _ he wouldn’t have to feel that horrible, gutting  _ whatever that was  _ that the Cosmic Force thought he felt for Satine Kryze.

 

* * *

 

_ What have I done? _

Qui-Gon reached out again, brushing against the minds of Mandalorians, and not finding what he sought.

_ I should not have accepted this call for help. _

His padawan might be an adult, but he wasn’t ready, he might  _ die  _ here—

_ I might die here. _

He’d been so confident in Obi-Wan’s competence, and no one else  _ could  _ go, and the idea of a Mand’alor who didn’t hate the Jedi had seemed like such a good thing to encourage, it was  _ progress,  _ the first sign Mandalore had ever shown of  _ wanting  _ to progress— 

_ I was a fool. _

His padawan was scared, but not for the right reasons, and certainly not scared  _ enough. _

_I wasn’t thinking about what they would do to him, if they caught him. I am used to winning against mercenaries. Even after Zan Arbor. Even after... after Tahl._

He’d lost sight of one, vicious truth:

Mandalorians hunted Jedi.

And they were  _ good  _ at it.

 

* * *

 

They got through to the other side.

Dawn was touching Draboon, and Satine peered into the landing zone from a position very nearly opposite the one they’d had at the ship.

“There’s an  _ army. _ ” Kenobi’s voice was rough after nearly forty-eight hours of silence, ever since the hunt became  _ real. _

His hand was shaking with the overload of adrenaline and sleep deprivation.

“I  _ said  _ it was dire. Why do you sound so surprised?”

“Because I want to  _ live. _ ” He sounded affronted, as if how  _ dare  _ Satine get him into something so big.

“Why?” Satine rolled her eyes, though the helmet hid it from his view. “Have a little girl or boy to go home to? A cute little  _ soft _ ?”

“She’s more brave than you could ever be!” he snapped back, and  _ now  _ he sounded  _ incensed. _

“‘Brave’ is not even a unit of measurement,” Satine scoffed. “Mando’a doesn’t even  _ have  _ a word to express ‘brave,’ because it’s the bare minimum  _ expected.  _ It was hard as hell to figure out what this word in Basic meant. We only have a word for  _ cowardice. _ And we  _ kill  _ people for  _ cowardice. _ ”

Kenobi wrenched off his helmet, revealing cheeks flushed with fury, eyes glittering with something that might easily grow into hate. “You kill people for  _ anything. _ It’s a wonder you’re not  _ extinct _ .”

“I’m working to prevent that,” Satine growled.

“Maybe they  _ should be! _ ”

“Padawan!” Jinn hissed.

Kenobi glared one long moment more at Satine, then his gaze shifted to his master, but he didn’t look at all repentant or ashamed.

_ Why would Jinn bring an apprentice who wants my people dead? _

It was very strange.

She turned back to looking at the army, zooming in her vision until she caught sight of the sigil on one of the ships. “Shabla Caderas!” she swore.

Kenobi’s fury faltered as he recognized he had no idea what she was upset about, just that it wasn’t him anymore. “What?”

“Clan Cadera. They haven’t even declared for a side, but they want Kryze land.”

“Take out the heir, hope that Rook takes out your father?” Jinn guessed.

Satine snarled. “Two hundred loyalist Kryzes against the full Clan Cadera? They take us out first, and _no one_ will take issue. Then throw their lot in with Rook, or sit it out, and wait to clean up the Kryzes that escape the war to straggle home in twos and threes.” Fury boiled in Satine’s blood. “Chakaar’se.”

“We have to find a place to sleep,” Jinn pointed out. “We can’t keep going like this without recharging.”

Satine drew in a steadying breath, recognized the truth of the Jedi’s words. “Sense anyone near?”

“No. They’re fanning out in the direction we abandoned the ship from.”

“Then we’ll go further, out of range of their ship’s scanners, and we’ll set up a little bubble to camouflage our heat sigs.”

“How do we do that?” Kenobi asked, sounding exhausted, the last of the energy of anger abandoning him in the face of how much  _ more  _ would be required of them before they could rest.

“Come on, Padawan,” Jinn murmured in encouragement. “Just a bit farther.”

 

* * *

 

Kryze had a large blanket, patterned with camouflage colors of greens and brown, designs similar to low brush playing across it.

Apparently it canceled out heat signatures, even from Mandalorian scanners.

Obi-Wan lay down, Qui-Gon lying beside him, and Kryze covered them up entirely, before moving away to keep watch.

“What about  _ her  _ heat signature?” Obi-Wan mumbled.

Qui-Gon shifted, turning onto his side, the sheet having interfered with his ability to breathe while lying on his back. “I’m sure she’s aware of it. I’ll take second watch, Obi-Wan. Just sleep now, while you can.”

_ I’m not a useless royal heir in need of help _ , Obi-Wan wanted to protest.  _ I’m not the one who called for aid. _

But he was too tired, too drained, and the armor was  _ uncomfortable,  _ and the helmet of a dead man stared at him, where it sat on the dirt in front of his face, propping up some of the blanket.

Frip it.

 

* * *

 

It took Qui-Gon longer to fall asleep, even with his body heavily tested and his mind exhausted from straining to hear the Force’s ambivalent whispers.

_ What can I do to keep my padawan alive? _

That was Qui-Gon’s chief priority, now.

Sneaking in to steal back their ship was pointless. Even if they stole it, where would they  _ go _ ? The Caderas must have been already in space and watching, to have followed them to Draboon. What would keep others from doing the same?

“At least you were right,” Qui-Gon murmured, hoping to ease some of Obi-Wan’s discomfort. “You  _ did  _ lose the pursuers. We just picked up new ones, farther down the line.”

He received only grim silence in reply, but Qui-Gon had far more important things to worry about than Obi-Wan’s grudge.

_ How long will they keep up the search before they decide to just strike another day? _

The hate that had exploded out from Satine when she spat the name  _ Cadera  _ also made Qui-Gon wonder just how far she was willing to go for peace.

_ Master Yoda, I think I jumped in way over my head. _

He’d gotten so used to being the hero. To missions turning out well because they were right and good missions.

_ Please don’t let that naivete get Obi-Wan killed. _

 

_* * *_

 

Satine kept first watch.

The younger Jedi certainly was not accustomed to being on the run for extended periods of time, and appeared fairly useless.

The older one seemed to understand more, and as the younger one’s struggle increased, the more the tenderness displayed by the older.

At least the little one knew how to obey. If he was the sort to demand  _ why  _ every time his father gave a direction, they would have all been dead already. A few times over.

Satine had at first resented the young one’s clear lack of  _ raising. _ He radiated contradictions— an understanding of the forest, of where to step and where to not, but a hesitance to kill wildlife. Like he wanted to  _ befriend  _ forest, as if the forest wasn’t out to murder him.

He’d fought well, had even maimed, but he knew _nothing_ of large-scale warcraft, including strategy and tactics. It was absurd. He also had turned inside out at the thought of killing two soldiers, though his master had _just killed_ the other.

So  _ in battle  _ was different than  _ just after  _ battle, apparently. Even when a half-second apart, and the battle-haze not yet faded from the blood.

She’d noticed Jinn throwing her glances in the aftermath of the skirmish. It was like he was reading something, or sensing something, perhaps studying something?

She wasn’t sure what he was looking at, since everything felt fairly normal. Her razor-edged determination to  _ live  _ and keep the two Jedi alive as well, the warm glow in her blood, the result of the kills, giving her heightened focus...

He was watching  _ something. _

It didn’t matter.

What she needed was a plan. Their immediate abandoning of the ship and flight into the woods had saved them once, and swift action had saved them the rest of it, but they were still three against a healthy turning out of a clan.

_ We need one hell of a plan. _

 

 


End file.
